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Jeffrey Bluestone, PhD

Vice Chair, Board of Directors

Biography

Jeffrey Bluestone is the president and chief executive officer of Sonoma Biotherapeutics and the A.W. and Mary Margaret Clausen Distinguished Professor at the Diabetes Center of The University of California, San Francisco.

Dr. Bluestone is a highly accomplished scientific researcher whose work over nearly three decades has focused on understanding the basic processes that control T-cell activation and immune tolerance in autoimmunity, organ transplantation, and cancer.

His research has led to the development and commercialization of multiple immunotherapies, including the first FDA-approved drug targeting T-cell costimulation to treat autoimmune disease and organ transplantation and the first FDA-approved CTLA-4 antagonist drugs for the treatment of metastatic melanoma. He was part of the team of early developers of a novel anti-CD3 monoclonal antibody, now called teplizumab, a pro-tolerogenic drug that has shown clinical activity in type 1 diabetes, psoriatic arthritis, and the reversal of kidney transplant rejection.

In addition to his research, Dr. Bluestone was the founding director of the Immune Tolerance Network, the largest NIH-funded multicenter clinical immunology research program, testing novel immunotherapies in transplantation, autoimmunity, and asthma/allergy. He recently led the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy as president and CEO. He served as a member of the Blue Ribbon Panel, a board of scientific experts appointed by then Vice President Joe Biden to guide the NCI Cancer Moonshot Research Initiative.

He was also the Ludwig Professor and director of the Ben May Institute at The University of Chicago and served as a senior investigator at the NCI. Dr. Bluestone holds a BS and an MS from Rutgers University and a PhD in immunology from the Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences.

Education & Training

  • 1980: Cornell Graduate School of Medical Science, PhD, Immunology
  • 1977: Rutgers, State University, MS, Microbiology
  • 1974: Cook College, Rutgers University, BS, Biology

Awards & Honors

  • 2016: National Cancer Foundation, Blue Ribbon Panel on Cancer Research (Biden Moonshot Program)
  • 2015: Federation of Clinical Immunology Societies, President-Elect
  • 2015: American Society of Transplantation, Outstanding Mentorship Award
  • 2013: National Academy of Medicine, Elected Member
  • 2010: American Academy of Allergy, Asthma, & Immunology, Elliott Middleton Memorial Lectureship
  • 2005: Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, Mary Tyler Moore & Robert Levine Excellence in Clinical Research Award
  • 2008: Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, Scholar Award
  • 2006: American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Elected Member
  • 1998: Cornell Medical School,  Distinguished Alumni Award
  • 2004: Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, Gerold & Kayla Grodsky Basic Science Award
  • 2004: American Society for Transplantation, Roche Distinguished Research Award
  • 1997: Guggenheim Foundation, Senior Fellowship
  • 1997: Fogarty Foundation, Senior Research Fellowship
  • 1989: American Cancer Society, Faculty Scholar
  • 1987 - 89: Gould Foundation, Faculty Scholar